Crusty Crabbs ooze six appeal in Big Slog triumph

Crusty Crabbs ooze six appeal in Big Slog triumph!

After a gap of several years the Lymington Cricket Club six-a-sides – aka ‘THE BIG SLOG’ – made a welcome return to the Sports Ground. The event was generously sponsored by Calcott Construction Ltd of Sturminster Newton, and to add a touch of Indian Premier League spice to affairs, an auction was held to decide the make up of the teams. Each participant was given a ‘jumper’ value (in homage to our legendary scoreboard operator) with all teams receiving a budget of 32 jumpers. Dom Hand, skipper of the ‘Dominators’, had no hesitation spending the majority of his budget on Kieran Moors, a decision he possibly later regretted when he saw the Ben Stokes lookalike take to the field in a fetching blue and gold cheerleaders dress. Similarly, and some what bizarrely, ‘Quigley’s Queries’ captain Billy Quigley opted to spend a massive 11 jumpers on former First XI has-been Ed Freeman, a transaction later investigated by the fraud squad. Cameron Robertson and Terry Crabb, respective captains of the ‘Camshafts’ and ‘Crusty Crabbs’, were rather more astute in their auction dealings, packing their teams with solid and dependable, but more modestly priced, all rounders. The Crusty Crabbs line up of Mssrs Crabb, Phillips, Hunt, Bowring and Tollerfield would prove to be the team to beat throughout the tournament. Click here to discover Billy Quigley’s pre-tournament thoughts.

The usual rules of six-a-side applied with each innings consisting of four eight ball overs, batsmen retiring at 25 runs and wides counting as fours runs. One novelty was the life sized cut-out of Lymo legend Darren Cowley, positioned appropriately at ‘Cowley Corner’, a direct hit earning the lucky batsman 25 runs.

Dom Hand’s big guns certainly proved their worth in match 1 as the Dominators overhauled Quigley’s Queries’ score of 62-1 with three balls to spare with Ambrose, Hand and Moors all smashing big sixes. Click here to see Hand destroying Quigley, and here to see the winning captain’s post match interview.

More maximums followed in match 2 as the Crusty Crabbs narrowly defeated the Camshafts thanks in the main to a seven ball retirement from captain Crabb. Click here to see Robertson’s thoughts on his team’s defeat.

Despite seeing their skipper cleaned up by veteran Neil Trestrail (see the send off here!), the Queries registered their first win in match 3 in a high scoring clash with the Camshafts, the highlight of which was a blistering innings from Simon Naylor who bludgeoned 29 runs from Jason Walbanke’s over and almost earned an extra 25 when his pull shot narrowly missed the cardboard Cowley. Click here to see Quigley celebrate his first (and only) victory.

Match 4 was dominated by Terry Crabb who retired and then returned to the fray to notch up 49 not out – the highest individual score of the day by some margin. Click here to see Crabby laying into a man in a dress and here to see Josh Bowring cleaned up by Dan Paxton. Crabb’s innings proved too much for the Dominators who mustered just 37 in reply with the rapidly drying out Josh Bowring returning figures of 1-2 from his eight ball over.

The last round of group matches saw the Crusty Crabbs clinch their place in the final with a 13 run win over the fading Queries for whom captain Quigley was enlightening proceedings with a series of exotic costumes including a clown’s outfit (this may possibly have been Australia’s new ODI uniform). Quigley then magically morphed into a stormtrooper, later claiming that the mask may have impeded his ability to see the ball, although others suggested this may have been down to the copious amounts of lager he’d consumed during the day. See Quigley batting here and his post match interview here.

As the players began to wilt in the heat, so did the scores. In their final group match the Dominators were bowled out for a dismal 24. Walbanke atoned for his earlier nightmare over, recording the day’s best bowling figures of 2-2. Despite losing Ollie Calcott third ball of the innings, the skipper Robertson and the wily Mark Jackson saw the Camshafts home with 16 balls to spare.

The Camshafts’ late resurgence meant that they, along with the Queries and the Dominators were tied for second place with one win each, and so a bowl-out was staged to decide who would face the Crusty Crabbs in the final. The pressure of the occasion was clearly getting to the players as everyone failed to hit the stumps with their first attempts, but eventually Walbanke, Calcott and Trestrail all hit the target to send the jubilant Camshafts into the final. Click here to see the footage of the bowl-off. Warning – you may fall asleep waiting for someone to hit the stumps!

Youngsters from the club’s colts section provided a guard of honour for the finalists – see the footage here. The final proved to be a cagey, low scoring affair. Bowring, Hunt and key man Crabb fell early, and with Robertson marshalling his Camshaft troops expertly, not a single boundary was scored in the Crusty Crabb innings – quite a rarity for a six a side match. However, if the Camshafts thought that the Crusty Crabbs would crumble, they reckoned without Chris Tollerfield who nurdled ones and twos (and the odd three) to help his team to 42-5. Bowring again produced a frugal over as the Camshafts began their innings cautiously. Dangerman Calcott survived a dropped catch but began to up the run rate before being stumped by Tollerfield off Hunt for 22. 10 runs were required from Crabb’s final over of the match. Robertson skied a return catch to the bowler second ball to bring Jackson to the crease with Trestrail. These two whittled the target down to four with two balls remaining. Jackson was then bowled to leave young Walbanke the onerous task of scoring four off the final ball. He could only manage two, giving the Crusty Crabbs a one run victory to end an enjoyable, if somewhat exhausting, day’s cricket. See the dramatic climax here.

The winners and losers retreated to the clubhouse for refreshments and to witness the presentation of the trophy to the Crabby Crabbs’ skipper Terry Crabb and wooden spoons to what remained of the Quigley’s Queries team (click here to see the presentations). Following the presentations the winning captain reflected on his team’s perfect performance see Terry’s interview here, while the losing skipper Cameron Robertson also gave his thoughts on where the final was won and lost, and offered advice for anyone looking for a reliable and affordable construction company in the Sturminster Newton area – click here for Cam’s interview.